


wish i was strong enough (to save not one but both of us)

by tightfistofnerves



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, I love the walking dead btw, Introspection, Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-23
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:28:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24869899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tightfistofnerves/pseuds/tightfistofnerves
Summary: The corner of Shane’s mouth ticked up as he spoke, and that was how you knew he was saying something funny, something he didn’t actually mean. Rick grunted a laugh. Sticky fingers and sticky sweat. Sure, the death would be slow, but only the worthwhile ones are, right?~or~Season 2: Rick is losing it. Shane isn't helping.
Relationships: Rick Grimes & Shane Walsh
Kudos: 5





	wish i was strong enough (to save not one but both of us)

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to write twd for forever 
> 
> title - inspired by the song "both of us"

Somewhere near the untainted green stretch of Hershel’s farm, amidst all the fierce rage and shouting, Shane calls him _brother_ , and Rick wonders exactly when it stopped being true.

Creaks are that of the windmill turning. The light breeze brushes past them and the argument’s fallen silent. Peace stretches thin in the air these days, threatening to snap. 

Rick grimaces. They’re so old now, with eyes drooping at the corners and ridged lines revealing grief and exhaustion. Far too old to be at each other's throats like this.

It _shouldn’t_ be like this. 

*

Grease stuck onto his fingers from the fries. Shane chowed down on a burger beside him. 

It had been a quiet day on patrol. Most of it spent in the cop car munching on fast food and scorching in the Atlanta heat that burned like fire through the roof. 

It was a slow death. 

The corner of Shane’s mouth ticked up as he spoke, and that was how you knew he was saying something funny, something he didn’t actually mean. Rick grunted a laugh. Sticky fingers and sticky sweat. Sure, the death would be slow, but only the worthwhile ones are, right? 

Looking back now, he thinks he could stay in that moment forever. 

*

Rick was a man of few needs before. None of the starch dress shirts and marble counters that his wife cared so much for. 

And now? There are only two: He needs to keep his family alive. He needs to be alive for his family. 

( _“You can’t protect them.”_ there’s that tick again.)

Shane’s eyes, so dark they seem depthless, implore him. The moon, cold and unforgiving, hangs in the black sky like a pearl on display. For a moment, when he gets so close Rick can smell the blood, Shane’s face opens up, clear as the field on Hershel’s farm. Glows pure and bright in the pale moonlight for half a second and-

Rick plunges the knife deep where there’s no coming back and thinks _brother or not brother of mine, this is what must be done._

*

Slow deaths are the hardest to accept.

Rick is screaming, at a corpse or fading body; it doesn’t matter, because _he did this to me, this was him, not me._

It shouldn’t be like _this_.


End file.
